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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29244603">on the edge</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/extasiswings/pseuds/extasiswings'>extasiswings</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>9-1-1 (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Almost Kiss, Angst, Confessions, Introspection, M/M, Not-Quite-Getting-Together, episode speculation</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 10:47:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,702</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29244603</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/extasiswings/pseuds/extasiswings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“Where’s Buck?” Hen asks as she swipes an alcohol pad over the cut on his cheek and secures it with two butterfly strips. </p>
<p>Eddie lowers the mask and coughs. “He was right—“</p>
<p><em>Behind me.</em> </p>
<p>[Or: Buck is trapped in a warehouse fire.  Eddie handles it the only way he knows how.]</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>460</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>on the edge</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The air inside the warehouse is thick with smoke and blisteringly hot.  A snapping sound splits through the crackle of flame and Eddie is abruptly yanked off balance as Buck grabs his arm and pulls hard just as a beam from above comes crashing down. It doesn’t miss him completely—catches the side of his helmet and knocks it off, making his ears ring with the impact. </p>
<p>He sees Buck’s mouth moving and shakes his head. </p>
<p>“What?” </p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Buck repeats, nearly shouting to be heard over the din of the fire. </p>
<p>A light fixture groans above them before dropping down as well and it’s Eddie’s turn to push Buck out of the way, even if it means a bit of flying glass catches him in the face. </p>
<p>“We need to get out of here,” he shouts, and it quickly turns into a coughing fit as he chokes on smoke, his throat and lungs burning. </p>
<p>Buck nods. “Go! I’m right behind!”</p>
<p>Eddie turns and manages to work out a path to the closest exit with a single-minded focus. His head is aching and he’s dizzy, can feel blood dripping down his cheek as well, and when he stumbles out into somewhat fresher air he nearly collapses into Bobby before he’s passed off to the paramedics. </p>
<p>Hen had been one of the first ones in and out and has since stripped off her turnout coat and is helping the other medics. Eddie doesn’t argue when she checks his throat and pupil responses before pressing an oxygen mask into his hand. </p>
<p>“Where’s Buck?” Hen asks as she swipes an alcohol pad over the cut on his cheek and secures it with two butterfly strips. </p>
<p>Eddie lowers the mask and coughs. “He was right—“</p>
<p><em>Behind me.</em> </p>
<p>The words fade on his tongue as he scans the area only to come up empty. And then his eyes light on the door he’d come out of, nothing clear beyond the frame but black smoke and the red and orange glare of flickering flames. </p>
<p>His world tips on its axis.  His vision swims.   And the feeling—</p>
<p>It reminds him a little of the tsunami, when he’d noticed Christopher’s glasses around Buck’s neck and had felt himself fracturing at such a rapid pace that even now he’s sure he wouldn’t have remained standing if he hadn’t caught sight of his son over Buck’s shoulder. He can feel the same sort of cracks spidering up the foundation of his walls—the ones that he throws up when he needs to be Eddie Diaz, <em>firefighter, medic, soldier, competent professional</em>, any version of himself that has to play at having his life together—and he scrambles internally to shut down the panic, to plaster over the cracks before they can spread too far, because if he lets himself think—</p>
<p>“I need to talk to Bobby,” he says, trying to push himself up to standing. Hen shoves him back down with hands firmly on his shoulders. </p>
<p>“You need to sit and keep breathing into that mask,” she says, her voice sharp with authority before it gentles. “I’ll get him, but only if you stay here.”</p>
<p>Eddie’s jaw tics, but he lifts the mask back up to his face and takes a few pointed breaths while she watches. Finally, she nods. </p>
<p>“I’ll be right back,” she promises. </p>
<p>There’s an itch between his shoulder blades that desperately wants an outlet. Something to do, something to control so he doesn’t feel so much like he’s on the edge of a cliff. So that he can work on a solution instead of his mind unhelpfully focusing on <em>Buck’s still in there</em>.  He’s not an idiot, he knows he’s in no shape to go back in himself, but he needs <em>something</em>. </p>
<p>“We were in the southwest quadrant,” Eddie reports when Hen returns with Bobby, keeping his words short and clipped.  “It wasn’t overrun but there were a lot of things falling from the upper levels. He said he was coming right after me, but he could have gotten stuck.”</p>
<p>This is easier. Staying mechanical. Sticking to facts. There’s no room for getting overly emotional, no allowance for breaking down.  He has a commanding officer in front of him who needs information, and that is something Eddie can handle. </p>
<p>“We tried him on the radio but there was no answer,” Bobby says. </p>
<p>“He may have dropped it.” <em>When he pulled me to safety.</em>   Eddie shuts that thought down. </p>
<p>“There are windows on that side,” he adds. “If the exits are blocked—“</p>
<p>“We’ll look at all possible options,” Bobby replies.  His face is drawn and tired, streaked with sweat and soot. </p>
<p>For some reason it’s the flicker of doubt Eddie catches in his eyes that makes him say—</p>
<p>“He wasn’t being reckless. I know—we all know he can be sometimes, but he wasn’t. If he’s not out, it’s because he needs help, not because he’s trying to be a hero.”</p>
<p>Bobby looks at Eddie for a moment, something passing across his eyes like recognition before it fades and he’s left looking more tired than before. </p>
<p>“We’ll look at all the options,” he repeats finally. He doesn’t make promises. Eddie’s not sure whether or not he appreciates that. </p>
<p>It takes another several minutes for anything to happen, and Eddie’s shoulders get tighter, his mood blacker. His head aches and he snaps at another paramedic, some clearly new young kid, when he notices him dressing a burn improperly. </p>
<p>It doesn’t make him feel better. </p>
<p>Finally though, finally, after a heart-stopping moment when the warehouse windows blow out on the side where they’d last been, Eddie hears shouts. And a figure comes stumbling around from the back of the building, knees giving out just in time for someone to catch him. </p>
<p>“What happened to <em>I’m right behind</em>?” Eddie asks roughly when Buck is helped over, looking worse for wear but alive. </p>
<p>Buck coughs and closes his eyes. “Part of the catwalk came down,” he says. “Blocked me in. Couldn’t see you. Couldn’t see anything hardly through all the...everything.”</p>
<p>“I didn’t know.”</p>
<p>Buck shakes his head and dutifully brings his own oxygen mask to his face when one is pressed into his hand. </p>
<p>“Wouldn’t have wanted you to stay even if you had,” he replies. “At least I had all my gear.” </p>
<p>Eddie wants to keep talking, keep asking questions, keep reminding himself that Buck is sitting next to him and going to be fine, but that irrational impulse wars with the rational thought that Buck needs oxygen not an interrogation. So he drops it.  And they both withdraw into their own heads. </p>
<p>Eddie watches though. As Buck flickers between present and vacant, numb. The haunted, hunted look that passes over his face every so often a clear indication that whatever ghosts are whispering in his mind, they’re saying nothing good. When the shift ends and they’re cleaned up, Buck still looks half-dead, so Eddie snatches his keys. </p>
<p>“I’m taking you home,” he says, tone booking no argument. “I don’t want you driving like this.”</p>
<p>Buck sighs and scrubs a hand over his face. “Okay.”</p>
<p>The drive is silent, but there’s a tension in the air, the weight of things unspoken. Eddie’s not entirely sure what exactly would roll off his own tongue if he opened his mouth, his head a mess, but when he parks his truck in front of Buck’s apartment, Buck finally speaks. </p>
<p>“You know what I was thinking while I stuck in that building? Besides that I was going to die.”  He swallows hard. “That if it had to be someone it was good it was me.”</p>
<p>Eddie’s heart stops, his stomach rebelling violently at sheer <em>wrongness</em> of the thought. </p>
<p>“That’s not true.”</p>
<p>Buck nods and lets out a small, bitter laugh. </p>
<p>“See, I do know that actually,” he admits. “It’s one of the things I’ve been working on in therapy. Except then my parents rolled into town and it was like none of that work mattered, I was right back to square one assuming I’m not wanted, that no one would miss me—and I hate, I <em>hate</em> that they have that kind of power, that they can make me feel so fucking worthless.”</p>
<p>“You’re not though.” Eddie reaches over before he can stop himself, his hand curling around the side of Buck’s neck, thumb settling over his pulse to feel that steady thrum of <em>alive alive alive</em>. “God, when I thought—you’re worth everything. You have to know—“</p>
<p>
  <em>You have to know how much you mean to me. You have to know how much I love you. You have to know I can’t lose you.</em>
</p>
<p><em>You have to know.</em> </p>
<p>Buck makes a small sound of disbelief, his gaze turning searching as Eddie bites his tongue to keep from saying too much he can’t take back. He feels somehow even more precariously positioned on the edge of a cliff than he had in the field, but that cliff was positioned above an ocean of grief. He doesn’t know what’s at the bottom of this one should he fall. </p>
<p>Somehow that’s almost more terrifying. </p>
<p>Eddie sways forward unconsciously and Buck presses his forehead to his. Neither of them are breathing steadily. And they stay like that for a long moment until Buck shivers and pulls back. </p>
<p>“I want to kiss you,” he says quietly, and Eddie can’t quite help the frisson of want that sparks through him, the whisper of <em>yes, please, do it then</em> that threads through his mind. </p>
<p>“But,” Buck continues, his tongue sweeping out to wet his lips as Eddie watches. “But it’s been a long and really fucking difficult day and I’m not—I don’t want to fuck this up before it even starts. If—if there’s anything to start at all, I don’t want to assume—“</p>
<p>“There is,” Eddie assures. <em>I love you. I’m in love with you.</em> </p>
<p>That gets him the faintest smile as Buck reaches up to squeeze his hand. </p>
<p>“Thanks for the ride home.”</p>
<p>“Of course. Anytime.”  </p>
<p>When Eddie gets home, he pauses long enough to check on Christopher before falling into bed. And only then does he think back over the day and finally, <em>finally</em> let himself shatter.</p>
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